Bangladesh Tackles Climate Change, Fuses Rice Paddies With Fish Farms

Low-lying countries like Bangladesh understand that they must adapt quickly to climate change – and explore a range of options. Saltwater intrusion is destroying rice paddies. Combining aquaculture with rice farming could increase nutrition levels of food, reduce environmental damage and increase output capacity of land and neighboring waters, suggests a report from a fisheries management researcher at the Bangladesh Agricultural University in the journal Ocean & Coastal Management. “Bangladesh's coastal aquaculture sector, which is dominated by export-oriented freshwater prawn and saline water shrimp farming, is already making a significant contribution to economic growth,” writes Naimul Haq for the Guardian. Waste from the shrimp-farming operations can improve soil for rice farming and can also contributes to natural pest control. – YaleGlobal